Maria told you of M. and Madame de Pastoret; in the same house on
another floor--for different families here have entire "apartments," you
observe the word, in one house--we met M. and Madame Suard: [Footnote:
M. Suard was editor of the _Publiciste._] he is accounted one of the
most refined critics of Paris, and has for many years been at the head
of newspapers of different denominations; at present he is at the head
of _La Publiciste._ He is prudent, highly informed, not only in books,
but in the politics of different states and the characters of men in all
the different countries of Europe. Madame Suard has the remains of much
beauty, a _belle esprit_, and aims at singularity and independence of
sentiment. Would you believe it, Mr. Day paid his court to her thirty
years ago? She is very civil to us, and we go to their house once a
week: literati frequent it, and to each of them she has something to
say.
At Madame de Pastoret's we met M. Degerando [Footnote: Marie Joseph
Degerando, writer on education and philosophy, 1772-1842.] and M.
Camille Jordan. Not Camille de Jourdan, the assassin, nor Camille
Desmoulins, another assassin, nor General Jourdan, another assassin, but
a young man of agreeable manners, gentle disposition, and much
information; he lives near Paris, with his Pylades Degerando, who is
also a man of much information, married to a pretty sprightly domestic
woman, who nurses her child in earnest. Camille Jordan has written an
admirably eloquent pamphlet on the choice of Buonaparte as first consul
for life; it was at first forbidden, but the Government wisely
recollected that to forbid is to excite curiosity. We three have had
profound metaphysical conferences in which we have avoided contest and
have generally ended by being of the same opinion. We went, by
appointment, to Madame Campan's--she keeps the greatest boarding-school
in France--to meet Madame Recamier, the beautiful lady who had been
nearly squeezed to death in London. How we liked the school and its
conductress, who professes to follow _Practical Education_, I leave to
Maria to tell you. How we like Madame Recamier is easily told; she is
certainly handsome, but there is nothing noble in her appearance; she
was very civil. M. de Prony, [Footnote: Gaspard Clair François Marie
Riche, baron de Prony, the great mathematician, 1755-1839.] who is at
the head of the Engineers des Ponts et Chaussées--civil engineers--was
introduced to us by Mr. Watt. I forgot to speak of him; he has just left
Paris. M. de Prony showed us models and machines which would have
delighted William. M. l'Abbé Morellet's niece next engaged our
attention; she and her husband came many leagues to see us; and we met
also Madame de Vergennes, Madame de Remusat, and Madame Nansoutit, all
people of knowledge and charming manners. Madame Lavoisier and the
Countess Massulski, General Kosciusko, Prince Jablounsk_i_, and Princess
Jablounsk_a_, and two other Princesses, I leave to Maria. Mons.
Edelcrantz, private secretary to the King of Sweden; Mons. Eisenman, a
German; Mons. Geofrat, the guardian from Egypt of the Kings of Chaldea
and seven Ibises; Mons. de Montmorenci--that great name: the Abbé
Sicard, who dines here to-morrow; Mons. Pang, Mons. Bertrant, Mons.
Milan, Mons. Dupont, Mons. Bareuil the illuminati man, and Mr. Bilsbury,
I leave to her and Charlotte.
MRS. EDGEWORTH _to_ MRS. MARY SNEYD.